


he said look up, your shoulders brush (no proof, one touch, you felt enough)

by youareiron_andyouarestrong



Category: The Flash (TV 2014)
Genre: F/M, Kissing, Tumblr Prompt
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-06-26
Updated: 2016-06-26
Packaged: 2018-07-18 06:59:52
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 912
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7304269
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/youareiron_andyouarestrong/pseuds/youareiron_andyouarestrong
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"I have you shoved against the wall but now I can’t stop looking at your mouth"</p><p>Iris learns news ways of touching Barry.</p>
            </blockquote>





	he said look up, your shoulders brush (no proof, one touch, you felt enough)

Iris can’t stop looking at Barry’s mouth. 

He’s got such a lovely smile, all big and brilliant with warm, crinkly eyes and a dimple high in his cheek and a full lower lip. She’s not sure which smile she likes more, the big unrestrained one he gets when his delight or joy is too much for him hold back, or the small, quiet, private ones he seems to keep for her alone, a shared glance or a silent joke. 

She wants to know what that mouth would feel like on hers. 

She knows _Barry_ already knows, seeing as how he’s had alternate timelines and parallel universes to find out in. And Iris doesn’t _usually_ begrudge him that, but honestly, she’d like the chance to catch up. Have something for herself in this crazy, ridiculous, terrifying, brilliant life she’s claimed. She’d fought for a long time against the idea of huge and overwhelming and overbearing, like  _destiny_ or _fate,_ but maybe this is something simpler than that. Maybe this is simply what Cisco calls a touchstone, or a fixed point in the universe. A universal truth. The sky is blue, water is wet, Barry Allen is with Iris West. And she’s with him. 

But back to Barry’s mouth. And honestly, Barry’s face, his broad shoulders, his long lanky legs, his big hands with long, clever fingers, his eyes that are somewhere between green and gray depending on the light or time of day. Barry’s _everything_ really, it’s sort of ridiculous. She wants his mouth, his hands, his shoulders; she wants in the sort of unrestrained, small-child-left-in-a-candy-store sort of way. All of it, and  _right now._ In this strange new normal, this  _apparently we’re meant for each other, the Speed Force is with us, the universe wants us to be together_  dance they’re doing, she’s slowly learning new ways to touch him, ways that hopefully communicate that she’s not… _adverse_ to the idea of being with him. Quite the opposite of that, honestly. But the thing Iris isn’t actually prepared for is that this casual touching, this unthinking affection–she’s already been _doing_ it all their lives. So now she needs to find _new_ ways to communicate, other methods. 

Right now, her method is–tickling. No really. Barry’s _absurdly_ ticklish and it’s a weapon Iris always has in her back pocket, ready to use at a moment’s notice. He sort of curls up in on himself, swats at her ineffectively, protests frantically in between bursts of laughter and Iris is usually laughing so much with him she forgets that she’s supposed to be tickling him and it just devolves into her getting to touch him without becoming self-conscious. 

Now, today, on this lazy Saturday afternoon, with no meta disasters approaching them, they’re talking and bickering and laughing together like they always do, and she’s backed him into the living room wall of her childhood house, digging her fingers into his sides and ribs as he squawks in protest and tries to squirm away from her. Admittedly, he’s not trying very hard, but then again, neither is she. 

His ribs are beneath her hands and his hands are on her back and it just– _fits._ Like a key in a lock, a piece in a puzzle. Soon out of self defense (or interest?), Barry’s long arms wrap around her and pull her close, no different than many of the other friendly hugs they’ve shared in the past–until it is.

If she stood on her toes, if he lifted her a little off the ground (and he _could_ ), their faces would be level. Right now, they’re both trying to catch their breath, panting for air, looking into each other’s faces. She can feel his heart pounding against hers, that steady thrum that means he’s alive, he’s here, with lightning in his veins. 

 _Mine,_ Iris thinks. _Always mine, since we were kids, before I even knew what love was._  

She tilts her head back to look into Barry’s face, beloved and as well-known as her own. His eyes are wide and focused utterly on hers, as if he’s afraid to blink or she’ll vanish. Which is sort of funny, if you think about it, because that’s the way Iris feels about him sometimes. 

She’s not as patient as Barry is. Never has been. 

So Iris rises a little further, tugs Barry’s head down to hers, and lets her mouth settle on his, warm and hungry and full of want. Barry breathes out a soft _“oh”_ against her mouth and she swallows it down, greedily and without restraint. He chases after her mouth with a long sigh of homecoming, of settling. 

It’s a long, unhurried, lazy kiss, slow as melting honey, and Iris thinks she now understands how Barry, who is now  _the impossible_ he spent his whole life looking for _,_ seems to find a way to do miracles after they touch.

Barry’s face is dazed and wondering when they part, looking at her like _she’s_ the miracle, and Iris presses her hand to his heart in an echo of a gesture that she made years ago. “It’s beating awfully fast,” she says, marveling.

“It always does that around you,” Barry replies and Iris presses her hands to it a little harder, like she might leave a mark there if she could. 

“Okay,” she says softly, smiling, Barry’s face beaming back at her, the universe coming to settle, the Speed Force can take a break. They’re good.      

**Author's Note:**

> the tickling thing is inspired by an actual interview with Candice Patton, who says in order to feel comfortable auditioning with Grant Gustin, she just grabbed him and started tickling him. best when listening to Taylor Swift's "You Are In Love" (which might be the ultimate Barry/Iris song)


End file.
